After 7 1/2 hours of deliberations, an Orleans Parish jury convicted a 23-year-old man of two 2007 murders and will consider whether to impose the death penalty Thursday morning.

Alfred Jones

Alfred Jones committed the first-degree murders of 16-year-old Ivan Brooks and his 17-year-old brother Damon Brooks when he emptied a 9mm handgun into the car where they sat.

Jones freely admits to the shooting, but claims it was self-defense - each of the 14 times he squeezed the trigger while standing outside the Chevy Impala where his victims sat.

The jury of seven women and five men rejected his testimony, and after a penalty phase hearing Thursday will consider sentencing him to die by lethal injection or condemn him to prison for the rest of his life.

The jury must once again make a unanimous decision to send Jones to death row - something rarely seen in Orleans Parish. Last year in the same courtroom, a jury sent Michael Anderson to death row for a quintuple murder in Central City, but the convictions were thrown out on appeal and Anderson awaits a new trial.

Darryl Keiffer, 22, survived 10 gunshot wounds that night to testify in court that Jones opened fire on the trio after they agreed to give him a short ride from the Lower 9th Ward to the 9th Ward.

The jurors, who have been sequestered since the trial opened Monday at Criminal District Court, had to render a unanimous verdict since Jones is charged with a capital crime.

Prosecutors want Jones sent to death row for the double homicide.

Jones testified that Keiffer pulled a gun after he pulled up to Kentucky Street, and that when he grabbed it the Brooks brothers attacked him.

No other weapons were found in the Impala. The 9mm handgun was never recovered, but the jury learned that the same weapon was used to kill 15-year-old Hilary Campbell in the 9th Ward on Jan. 3, 2007. Campbell was a friend of Keiffer.

Jones testified that Keiffer was out to get him over the theft of $7,000 worth of drug-dealing money.

"I want you to vote your conscience," defense attorney Rick Teissier told the jury in closing arguments. "A lot of lives have been lost. This is a question about whether another life should be lost."

Teissier called Keiffer a liar, a thief, a drug dealer and a murderer who is only in court to send Jones away for life.

Assistant District Attorney John Alford said that Keiffer risked his life by testifying - defying the code of the streets that Jones talked about on the stand, saying he wouldn't rat anyone out on a murder charge.

"You think it's easy for a young black man to come in here and testify?" Alford asked the jury, pointing at the defendant's family. "In front of them, the people shaking their heads."

Teissier objected, "He doesn't live by that code."

Alford continued, "This is a no-win situation for Darryl Keiffer. The only thing he might get is put in a body bag. But he wasn't going to let the Brooks' parents live the rest of their lives without getting justice."